Episode 2
Fruits of Labor is Round 2 of the anime adaptation of Morikawa Jouji's Hajime no Ippo series. Ippo's goal was to catch 10 leaves, with only a week to do so. While balancing school and work, Ippo also practiced his jabs. Finally, he figured out not only to increase the speed of his jabs, but also caught all 10 leaves in his left hand. Impressed, Takamura then assigns Ippo to work out his muscles, body and running speed for one month. Once done, Takamura takes Ippo back to the gym to test out his skills. His first test was to spar with a rookie the same age as Ippo. Summary Ippo continues trying to catch the leafs for a whole week over and over again, day and night. Meanwhile, he finds out that he needs the sound Takamura made with his fist. He remembers how Takamura moved his fist, and copied it until he made it. Ippo makes his first jab, and then continues to throw jabs until he stops so he can do it to catch ten leafs as Takamura said to him. The next day, as Takamura does some roadwork he finds Ippo sitting in the side of the track, waiting for him. Ippo said that he has found the way to catch ten leafs. As Takamura is waiting, Ippo hits the tree, for the leafs to come down and gets ready to catch ten of them. Ippo starts to throw jabs but he only catches ten leafs with his left, and not his both hands. Takamura is surprised and tells him to throw jabs. Ippo over does it, and Takamura gets angry and makes a swing at him to stop. The next day, Takamura introduces Ippo to the Kamogawa Boxing Gym, but as Ippo tries to say hello to the other gym mates, Kamogawa Genji and Yagi Haruhiko come out of the room and see the new face Takamura brought to the gym, Ippo. He takes Takamura immediately behind the door and shouts that Ippo is not the kind of person for boxing and that he is disappointed with him. Afterwards Takamura takes Ippo to the changing room and to tell him that he will be sparring. Ippo doesn't like the sound of it, but he changes and gets ready for his sparring match. As Ippo comes out with Takamura and sees Kamogawa and Yagi, Takamura asks of who he will be sparring, and Kamogawa shows Miyata Ichirō. Ippo gets in the ring, with Takamura as his second. The bell rings and Ippo swings completely off what boxing is, Miyata just catches and leaves Ippo's fists as they are nothing at all. Takamura shouts to Ippo to be the turtle and he does it. As Ippo left his body wide open, Miyata comes out with a body blow, and then with a left he hits him in the face as Ippo goes down talking to himself, that he cannot understand what happened, and that it was really quick. Trivia *The English dub version mistakenly has Aoki and Kimura in the English cast credits even though they did not appear in this episode. Anime and Manga Differences *The anime adds the following: **There's more dialog when Takamura explains that Ippo needs to catch 10 leaves. **The leaf training is extended, there's added scenes of Ippo being late for breakfast, trying to practice in school, seeing the boat off at the fishing boat, and encountering Umezawa and his gang. **The anime adds a scene where Ippo does his one month training that Takamura advised. *The anime changed the following: **When the week is up for the leaf training, Takamura finds Ippo resting in the grass in the anime. In the manga, Ippo is resting up against the tree. **When Ippo is jabbing Takamura's hand, in the anime, Takamura kicks the back of his neck. In the manga Takamura hits him in the head with his fist. **In the manga, Kamogawa and Yagi were watching Leonard vs. Hearns world match. But in the anime, they were watching a world match between two unknown boxers. **Kamogawa in the manga is wearing his brown business suit. In the anime he was wearing his white KBG shirt. **When Kamogawa first sees Ippo, in the manga, he grabs Takamura by his arm, in the anime he grabs him by the neck with his cane. *The spar of Ippo against Miyata is portrayed differently in the anime. **When the match first begins in the anime, Ippo goes towards Miyata with awkward punches that Miyata blocks and dodges. Then when he puts his guard up, Miyata hits him with a body blow. In the manga, Miyata attacks first while Ippo blocks the punches until Miyata hits him with a body blow. **When Ippo goes down, in the anime, he falls and lands on his side, in the manga, he falls and hangs onto one of the ropes. *Miyata Senior is absent during this spar in the anime. In the manga, he was Miyata's cornerman. Credits Characters are named as they appear in the credits. fr:Le Fruit des Efforts Category:Anime Episodes Category:Season 1 Episodes